Livelihood transition and border practices of animal husbandry in Himalaya borderlands

Keywords: Himalayan borderlands, non-human, geopolitics, livelihood system
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Friday
Session Start / End Time: 2/25/2022 09:40 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/25/2022 11:00 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 3

Abstract

Borderlands are places where multiple actors, particularly sovereign states, jointly shape the modalities of the border. The livelihood practice is one of the most dynamic forms of practice in border shaping. Taking the case of animal husbandry in Himalayan borderlands, this paper integrates firsthand and secondhand materials collected from the field, historical documents, news media, and government official websites to explore the interactions between the transition of animal husbandry and the modalities of the border, accentuating the role of non-human factors in shaping the border. On the one hand, the geographical relationship between sovereign countries strongly shapes the boundary characteristics from top to bottom, exerting an influence on the characteristics of cross-border grazing and transformation of animal husbandry in borderlands. On the other hand, border animal husbandry, which is related to livelihood and sustainable development, is also actively shaping border patterns with an increasing trend, thus affecting geographical relations between countries. This paper provides a meso-micro perspective for border studies that integrate everyday geopolitical and geo-economic research. This approach provides a more comprehensive way to understand interactions between geographical environment and geo-relations, which can, to a certain extent, help avoid the cognitive bias of traditional state-centered and geo-competitive logic. Future studies may dive more into the nuanced connections between macro geopolitics and micro border livelihood.